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ON THE CONSTITUTION OF THE CHURCH AND STATE, ACCORDING TO THE IDEA OF EACH; WITH AIDS TOWARD A RIGHT JUDGMENT ON THE LATE CATHOLIC BILL |
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GLOSSARY TO THE APPENDED LETTER As all my readers are not bound to understand Greek, and yet, according to my deepest convictions, the truths set forth in the following Combat of Wit between the Man of Reason and the Man of the Senses have an interest for all, I have been induced to prefix the explanations of the few Greek words, and words minted from the Greek: COSMOS -- world. TOUTOS cosmos -- this world. HETEROS -- the other, in the sense of opposition to, or discrepancy with some former; as Hetorodoxy, in opposition to Orthodoxy. ALLOS -- an other, simply and without precluding or superseding the one before mentioned. ALLOCOSMITE -- a Denizen of another world. MYSTES, from the
Greek
N.B. -- Where a person mistakes the anomalous misgrowths of his own individuality for ideas, or truths of universal reason, he may, without impropriety, be called a Mystic, in the abusive sense of the term; though pseudo-mystic, or phantast, would be the more proper designation. Heraclitus, Plato, Bacon, Leibnitz, were Mystics, in the primary sense of the term: Iamblichus, and his successors, Phantasts.
And here, though not falling under the leading title, Glossary, yet, as tending to the same object, that of fore-arming the reader for the following dialogue, I transcribe two or three annotations, which I had penciled, (for the book was lent me by a friend who had himself borrowed it), on the margins of a volume, recently published, and entitled, "The Natural History of Enthusiasm." They will, at least, remind some of my old school-fellows of the habit, for which I was even then noted: and for others they may serve, as a specimen of the Marginalia, which, if brought together from the various books: my own and those of a score others, would go near to form as bulky a volume as most of those old folios, through which the larger portion of them are dispersed. I. "Whatever is practically important on religion or morals, may at all times be advanced and argued in the simplest terms of colloquial expression." -- p. 21. I do not believe this. Be it so, however. But why? Simply, because the terms and phrases of the Theological Schools have, by their continual iteration from the pulpit, become colloquial. The science of one age becomes the common sense of a succeeding. -- See Aids to Reflection, pp. 7-11; but especially the note at p. 252.) The author adds -- "from the pulpit, perhaps, no other style should at any time be heard." Now I can conceive no more direct means of depriving Christianity of one of its peculiar attributes, that of enriching and enlarging the mind, while it purifies, and in the very act of purifying, the will and affections, than the maxim here prescribed by the historian of Enthusiasm. From the intensity of commercial life in this country, and from some other less creditable causes, there is found even among our better educated men, a vagueness in the use of words, which presents, indeed, no obstacle to the intercourse of the market, but is absolutely incompatible with the attainment or communication of distinct and precise conceptions. Hence in every department of exact knowledge, a peculiar nomenclature is indispensable. The Anatomist, Chemist, Botanist, Mineralogist, yea, even the common Artizan, and the rude Sailor, discover that "the terms of colloquial expression," are too general and too lax to answer their purposes: and on what grounds can the science of self- knowledge, and of our relations to God and our own spirits, be presumed to form an exception? Every new term expressing a fact, or a difference, not precisely and adequately expressed by any other word in the same language, is a new organ of thought for the mind that has learnt it. II. "The region of abstract conceptions, of lofty reasonings, has an atmosphere too subtle to support the health of true piety." -- In accordance with this, the Supreme in his word reveals barely a glimpse of his essential glories. By some naked affirmations we are, indeed, secured against grovelling notions of the divine nature; but these hints are incidental, and so scanty, that every excursive mind goes far beyond them in its conception of the Infinite Attributes." -- p. 26. By abstract conceptions the author means what I should call Ideas, and as such contradistinguish from conceptions, whether abstracted or generalized. But it is with his meaning, not with his terms, that I am at present concerned. Now that the personeity of God, the idea of God as the I AM, is presented more prominently in Scripture, than the (so called) physical attributes, is most true; and forms one of the distinctive characters of its superior worth and value. It was by dwelling too exclusively on the infinities, that the ancient Greek Philosophers, Plato excepted, fell into Pantheism, as in later times did Spinosa. I forbid you, says Plato, to call God the infinite! If you dare name him at all, say rather the Measure of Infinity. Nevertheless, it would be easy to place in synopsi before the author such a series of Scripture passages, as would incline him to retract his assertion. The Eternal, the Omnipresent, the Omniscient, the one absolute Good, the Holy, the Living. the Creator as well as Former of the Universe, the Father of Spirits -- can the author's mind go far beyond these? Yet these are all clearly affirmed of the Supreme ONE in the Scriptures. III. The following pages from p. 26 to p. 36 contain a succession of eloquent and splendid paragraphs on the celestial orders, and the expediency or necessity of their being concealed from us, least we should receive such overwhelming conceptions of the divine greatness as to render us incapable of devotion and prayer on the Scripture model. "Were it," says the eloquent writer, "indeed permitted to man to gaze upwards from step to step, and from range to range of these celestial hierarchies, to the lowest steps of the Eternal Throne, what liberty of heart would afterwards be left him in drawing near to the Father of Spirits?" But the substance of these pages will be found implied in the following reply to them. More weight with me than all this Pelion upon Ossa of imaginary Hierarchies has the single remark of Augustine, there neither are nor can be but three essential differences of Being, viz. the Absolute, the Rational Finite, and the Finite irrational; i.e. God, Man, and Brute! Besides, the whole scheme is unscriptural, if not contra-scriptural. Pile up winged Hierarchies on Hierarchies, and outblaze the Cabalists, and Dionysius the Areopagite; yet what a gaudy vapor for a healthful mind is the whole conception (or rather Phantasm) compared with the awful Hope held forth in the Gospel, to be one with God in and through the Mediator Christ, even the living, co-eternal Word and Son of God! But through the whole of this eloquent Declamation, I find two errors predominate, and both, it appears to me, dangerous errors. First, that the rational and consequently the only true Ideas of the Supreme Being, are incompatible with the spirit of prayer and petitionary pleading taught and exemplified in the Scriptures. Second, that this being the case, and "supplication with arguments and importunate requests" being irrational and known by the Supplicant to be such, it is nevertheless a duty to pray in this fashion. In other words, it is asserted that the Supreme Being requires of his rational creatures, as the condition of their offering acceptable worship to him, that they should wilfully blind themselves to the light, which he had himself given them, as the contra-distinguishing character of their Humanity, without which they could not pray to him at all, and that drugging their sense of the truth into a temporary doze, they should make believe, that they knew no better! As if the God of Truth and Father of all lights resembled an Oriental or African Despot, whose courtiers, even those whom he had himself enriched and placed in the highest rank, are commanded to approach him only in beggars' rags and with a beggarly whine. I on the contrary find "the Scripture model of devotion," the prayers and thanksgiving of the Psalmist, and in the main of our own Church Liturgy, perfectly conformable to the highest and clearest convictions of my Reason. (I use the word in its most comprehensive sense, as comprising both the practical and the intellective, not only as the Light but likewise as the Life which is the Light of Man. John 1. 3.) And I do not hesitate to attribute the contrary persuasion principally to the three following oversights. First (and this is the Queen Bee in the Hive of error), the identification of the universal Reason with each man's individual Understanding, subjects not only different but diverse, not only allogeneous but heterogeneous. Second, the substitution of the idea of the Infinite for that of the Absolute. Third and lastly, the habit of using the former as a sort of Superlative Synonime of the vast or indefinitely great. Now the practical difference between my scheme and that of the Essayist, for whose talents and intentions I feel sincere respect, may perhaps be stated thus. The essayist would bring down his understanding to his Religion: I would raise up my understanding to my reason, and find my Religion in the focus resulting from their convergence. We both alike use the same penitential, deprecative and petitionary prayers; I in the full assurance of their congruity with my Reason, He in a factitious oblivion of their being the contrary. The name of the Author of the Natural History of Enthusiasm is unknown to me and unconjectured. It is evidently the work of a mind at once observant and meditative. And should these notes meet the Author's eye, let him be assured that I willingly give to his genius that respect which his intentions without it would secure for him, in the breast of every good man. But in the present state of things, infidelity having fallen into disrepute, even on the score of intellect, yet the obligation to shew a reason, for our faith having become more generally recognized, as reading and the taste for serious conversation have increased, there is a large class of my countrymen disposed to receive, with especial favour, any opinions that will enable them to make a compromise, between their new knowledge and their old belief. And with these men, the author's evident abilities will probably render the work a high authority. Now it is the very purpose of my life to impress the contrary sentiments. Hence these notes. S. T. COLERIDGE.
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